The 5 basic characteristics of wine

Understanding the key traits of wine will help you tighten your grip on what kinds of wine you like, and help you choose the best wines for your taste.

While there are many ways to describe wine, we’ve highlighted the 5 most essential characteristics.

Sweetness

Sweetness is often the first impression a wine makes. We perceive sweetness starting at the tip of the tongue, and it can make our taste buds tingle. Sweetness in a wine comes from the residual sugar that wasn’t converted into alcohol during the winemaking process. A wine with very little sweetness is referred to as a dry wine.

Acidity

Acidity in a wine can taste tart, sour, sharp or zesty. High acidity can feel like biting into an apple or sucking on a slice of lemon. It makes your mouth pucker. Wines with low acidity can feel more rich and round, while high-acidity wines come across as lighter or more spritzy.

Tannin

Tannin can be described as astringent, bitter or having a drying sensation in the mouth. Tannins are compounds that occur naturally inside the skin of grapes. They add balance and structure to wines and can help them last longer. Tannins can also come from the oak barrel a wine is aged in.

Alcohol

We taste alcohol toward the back of our mouths as a warming sensation in the throat. Wines can range in alcohol content from 5.5% alcohol by volume up to 20%, though on average, wines tend to stay between 11-13%.

Body

Wines are often described as being light, full or medium bodied, and these descriptions often come from the overall sensation of the first four characteristics we’ve described: the level of sweetness, acidity, tannin and alcohol. Light bodied wines are often more acidic and have lower levels of alcohol, tannin and sweetness. Full bodied wines are the opposite.